The Last Private Eye (11 page)

“I don't think so, no.”

“No. Of course not. Well, Mr.—what did you say your name was?”

“Rhineheart.”

“Rhineheart, of course.” Hughes swayed to the left. “Well, Mr. Rhineheart, what can I do for you?”

“You could answer some questions.”

Hughes smiled, a loose, silly, drunken smile. “I know who you are,” he said, pointing a finger at Rhineheart. “You're the chap who's looking for Carl Walsh. The private”—Hughes hiccuped—“eye.”

“That's me.”

Hughes waved a hand. “Fire away, old man. Hope I can be of some help.”

“When was the last time you saw Walsh?”

Hughes wrinkled up his forehead. “Let me think. Sometime Wednesday afternoon. I popped by the barn. Walsh was in the tack room with a couple of the other lads. I think they were playing cards.”

“He seem any different than usual?”

“Not that I can recall.”

“What can you tell me about Walsh?”

“How do you mean?”

“I'm trying,” Rhineheart said, “to get an idea of what kind of person he was.”

Hughes took another swallow of his drink. His voice took on a light slur. Walsh, he said, was a pleasant enough chap. Did what he was told. Came to work on time usually. Hughes understood that Walsh liked his drink and liked to chase the ladies, but who didn't?

“Did he gamble?” Rhineheart asked.

“I really don't know.”

“Walsh get along with his fellow employees?”

“I suppose so.”

“Last week,” Rhineheart said, “you and Walsh had an argument behind the barn. What was it about?”

Hughes flashed a stiff smile at Rhineheart. “To tell you the truth, old man, I don't really remember what it concerned. I probably had to dress him down for something he did—or more likely, something he didn't do. Walsh is not the only lad I've ever had to tongue lash. It's something that comes with the head trainer's job, I'm afraid.”

“You think of any reason why Walsh'd leave so abruptly?” Rhineheart asked.

“Obviously, you're not very well acquainted with race-trackers, Mr. Rhineheart. They're gypsies. They come and go as they please. At the drop of a hat.” Hughes drained his drink.

Rhineheart looked around the room. People stood around in little groups, drinks in hand. They were partying hard, as if it were a job. The music—some heavy-metal shit—had been turned up a couple of decibels and someone had laid out a line of coke on the coffee table. The spiky-haired blonde was bent over the table.

It was time to split, Rhineheart decided. He wasn't getting anywhere with Hughes anyway. He made it a point to thank Hughes courteously, excused himself, and made his way out of the place. None of the partygoers seemed to notice his departure.

On the way home he stopped at O'Brien's. The place was almost empty. It was Wanda Jean's night off. McGraw was out on her date, having a good time, no doubt. For a moment he considered calling Kate Sullivan. Then he realized she was probably spending the night with her husband and her kids. He ordered a drink and sat on a stool at the bar.

He had a couple of doubles and Sam, the bartender, came over and leaned on the bar top and asked Rhineheart how he was doing. Sam was in his sixties and had been around the block a time or two. Rhineheart tried to get him to talk about the old days before TV, when everything, life itself, seemed to have more meaning than it did now and everyone was nicer and money wasn't everything and the Kentucky Derby was the only horse race in the world and people from all over came to Louisville to see it.

But all Sam wanted to talk about was basketball. He asked Rhineheart who was going to have the best team. U. of K.? U. of L.? Indiana?

Rhineheart shrugged. He couldn't get interested in roundball until December. He wanted Sam to tell him about the Brown Hotel and the celebrities who stayed there back in the forties and about all the great races, but he just sat there and listened to the old man talk about seven footers and power forwards until closing time.

Just before Rhineheart got up to leave, a dumpy woman in a print dress who had been sitting at one of the tables walked over to him. She put her hand on his arm, and in a voice full of sympathy, said, “You had a bad day at the track, didn't you, son?”

“Actually,” Rhineheart said, “I won.”

“Don't kid me,” the woman said. “I can always tell a loser when I see one.” She patted him on the shoulder. “Well, maybe you'll do better tomorrow,” she said. But there was no conviction in her voice. She gave him a bleary smile and shuffled out the front door.

Rhineheart looked at himself in the mirror behind the bar. The woman was right: he had loser written all over him.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

When Rhineheart woke up the next morning the sun was coming up. He threw on some jeans and a windbreaker and drove out to the Downs. He parked the car on Longfield Avenue, showed his pass to the gate guard, and walked over to the backstretch.

The area around the clocker's stand was crowded with racetrackers and press people. The track was filled with horses working out. Rhineheart spotted an old friend, a small-time trainer named Murphy, sitting on the rail. Murphy made room for him.

“How are ya, Rhineheart?”

“I'm okay, Murph.”

“Come to see the workouts?”

“I come to see Royal Dancer. He on the track?”

Murphy nodded. “Somewhere.”

“Do me a favor,” Rhineheart said. “Point him out to me when he comes by.”

“Sure.”

Murphy gestured at the crowd around the gap. “You ever see anything like this? It's a goddamn circus, ain't it?”

Looking around, Rhineheart agreed. In the crowd he noticed a familiar figure: Howard Taggert. Taggert was talking to a short, broad-shouldered man wearing a wide-brimmed Stetson.

“Who's the guy in the hat?” Rhineheart asked Murphy.

“Which one?”

“Talking to Taggert.”

“That's the vet, Doc Gilmore,” Murphy said.

DR. G.

Gilmore. The name sounded familiar. “How come I know that name, Murph?”

“He's the one the Arkansas racing commission brought up on charges a few years back. Made all the papers.”

For doping horses, Rhineheart remembered. “Whatever happened?”

Murphy shrugged. “He got acquitted.”

“He Taggert's vet?”

Murphy nodded, then pointed to a lean chestnut rounding the clubhouse turn, a helmeted exercise rider on its back.

“Royal Dancer,” he said.

Royal Dancer's stride was fluid and easy. He was, Rhineheart saw, a good-looking colt.

“What kind of horse is he, Murph?”

Murphy shrugged. “He's a stakes winner. Got all kinds of speed.”

“He got any kind of chance?”

“In the Derby?” Murphy shook his head. “I doubt it. Hasn't run enough, for one thing. He win that race back in January in Florida big, then didn't run again until last month in Arkansas. He had a big lead and quit. Run seventh, eighth, I forget. He didn't show me a lot. Plus, I don't like the way Hughes trains that Cresthill stock. Works 'em too hard in the mornings, you ask me.”

“His owner seems to think he's got a chance,” Rhineheart said.

Murphy shrugged. “Lots of dreams floating around out here. Lot of dreamers.”

“You know Kingston?”

“I see him around,” Murphy said. “We don't exactly move on the same social levels.”

“What about Taggert?”

“Same thing. Why are you asking about them two?”

“No special reason. Just interested.”

“You on a . . . case, or something?”

“Something.”

“Word around here is that Taggert and Kingston can't stand each other's guts.”

“How come?”

Murphy shrugged. “There's some bad blood between them. Goes back in the past. Something to do with a mare one of them owned.”

“What do you think about Taggert's horse?”

“Calabrate? He'll be one of the favorites. Got a real shot, run a big race in the Wood. Personally though, I like this here horse—” Murphy pointed at a dark gray whose rider was standing straight up in his stirrups. “Blustering.”

Murphy began to explain why he liked Blustering, but Rhineheart wasn't listening. He was looking around for Taggert and Gilmore. They had disappeared.

Rhineheart was walking back to his car when he noticed a flurry of activity around Barn 41, the building where all the Derby horses were stabled.

Eight to ten reporters and photographers were grouped around a figure he recognized.

Duke Kingston.

Kingston looked as if he were posing for a cover of
Gentleman's Quarterly
. He wore a cashmere sportcoat and linen trousers and a scarf tied around his neck. He was being interviewed and a cameraman with a minicam on his shoulder was filming the scene.

Rhineheart was too far away to be noticed, but close enough to overhear. The perfect position for a private eye.

“Where's Royal Dancer right now, Mr. Kingston?” a reporter asked.

Kingston gestured in the direction of the backstretch. “He's out on the track, working out.”

“How's he coming up to the race?” someone asked.

“Supah,” Kingston said. “Just supah.”

“How about you, sir?”

“I'm doing okay, too.”

Everyone laughed.

“What kind of chance do you think he has on Saturday?”

“Just a small one,” Kingston said. “Everything depends on the pace. If it's slow and Dancer gets out there and Julio gives him the sort of ride he's capable of, why then we think we might have a chance to steal some part of the purse money, maybe get on the board anyway.”

“Don't you really mean, Mr. Kingston, that you might have a chance to win?”

“Of course.”

“How do you feel about your horse being a long shot?”

“I'm glad Royal Dancer can't read the odds board.”

“Is Dancer the best three-year-old colt you've ever had, Mr. Kingston?”

Kingston shook his head. “I don't know. I guess we'll see about that come Saturday, won't we?”

“Can your colt go a mile and a quarter, Mr. Kingston?”

“We think he can, yes. Again though, we won't know for sure until after the race is over.”

“Mr. Kingston, your horse is known for his early speed. Aren't you afraid that when the time comes he'll have nothing left for the stretch run?”

“Son, when you been in the racing game as long as I have, you either stop being afraid of all the possible consequences, or else you get out of the business.”

“Mr. Kingston, can you tell us something about—”

Rhineheart spun on his heel and headed for the exit, shaking his head with a kind of sneaking admiration. Kingston was something. A high-level bullshitter. He had handled one question after another deftly and easily. His voice and his gestures were assured and decisive. Whatever else he was, Rhineheart thought, the man had presence, style.

Rhineheart drove home and went back to sleep for a few hours. He woke at noon, showered, shaved, and dressed. He drank a cup of coffee and read the morning paper. He was on the editorial page and his second cup when the telephone rang.

It was Karen Simpson.

“I thought maybe you might like to come over and interrogate me some more.”

“I'm going to be busy today, babe. But I'll try to make it.”

“You promise?”

“Cross my heart and hope to die.”

She giggled and hung up. Rhineheart dialed the office.

McGraw answered the phone.

“Rhineheart Investigations. McGraw speaking.”

“Morning, McGraw.”

“
Morning!
Are you serious? It's twelve-thirty. Don't tell me you're just now getting up. You ought to be ashamed of yourself. No self-respecting private eye would sleep as late as you do, Rhineheart.”

The best way to handle McGraw's lectures, Rhineheart had discovered, was to ignore them.

“I get any calls?”

“Negative. What time are you coming in?”

“Later on,” Rhineheart said.

“I love how specific you are. Precise.”

“You going to be there?”

“I don't know. Maybe. I've got a class at four.”

McGraw was into adult education courses. “Sociology?”

“Tai kwan do.”

“That shit won't do you any good in a street fight,” Rhineheart said. “The thing you want to do if someone messes with you is pick up something—a bottle, a brick, whatever it takes.”

“Is that the Michael P. Rhineheart theory of self-defense?”

“It's no theory. It's the real thing.”

“You going to see Jessica Kingston again?”

“Yeah.”

“What's she want to see you about?”

“No idea.”

“Well, be careful.”

“I'm always careful,” Rhineheart said.

“She's out of your league, Rhineheart.”

“Thanks for the advice, McGraw.”

“And Rhineheart?”

“Huh?”

“Let her pick up the check. She can afford it.”

“Good-bye, McGraw.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“I think my husband's considering offering you a job, Mr. Rhineheart. He was very impressed with you.”

Rhineheart took a sip of his drink. Jessica Kingston, who sat across the table, was wearing a light-colored summer dress. She looked terrific.

They were in the bar off the lobby of the Seelbach. It was an old-timey and elegant hotel, the kind of place that had a doorman who wore top hat and tails. F. Scott Fitzgerald had written about the Seelbach. Gatsby had taken Daisy to a dance there.

“I saw him this morning,” Rhineheart said.

“Duke?”

“Out at the track. He was holding a press conference. He handled himself very well.”